loggerhead sea turtles
Nesting Nights: Shrinking Habitat
Editor's note: This is the fourth in a series of posts from Emily and Kerri Lynn's trip to North Carolina to watch loggerhead sea turtles nesting this week.
You may have noticed the lack of update yesterday – we were on the beach during the wee hours of Thursday morning watching another nesting mother (!), and then we drove over to the Topsail Island Sea Turtle Hospital for most of the day, so stay tuned for full posts (and photos) on those events next week.
But for today, I wanted to return to a recurring theme in this week’s adventure: beach erosion. When I came down to Bald Head last September to see loggerhead hatchlings, I didn’t hear a word about beach erosion. That’s not to say it wasn’t happening, but this time, it’s on everybody’s lips.
Nesting Nights: Lucky 13
Editor's Note: This is the third in a series of blog posts chronicling Emily and Kerri Lynn's trip to North Carolina to find nesting loggerhead sea turtles. Read yesterday's update and stay tuned for more.
I could leave you in suspense about what happened last night, but I won’t because it’s too exciting. We saw a female loggerhead last night – the same one twice, in fact.
As usual we got to the beach around 10. We didn’t ride in the utility vehicles this time because the night before (a few hours after we left), Lola’s axle broke.
So we chatted with Brett, the BHIC’s sea turtle biologist, who showed us how to make the sand light up. Bald Head’s beach is bioluminescent at night, so when you take a step, your footprint is illuminated like the night sky for a few seconds. It kept the kids – and us – very entertained.
At 11 we saw a bright red headlamp light flickering 100 yards or so down the beach. Brett radioed the interns. No answer. The bouncing red light got closer, and turtle intern Anna came into view.
“Turtle!” she said. “But I think it’s gonna be a false crawl.” We dashed down the beach. We stopped when we spotted the dark oval on the side of the dune. She was, incredibly, climbing up a fairly steep dune. “She’s looking for dry sand,” said an intern.
Nesting Nights: A Bumpy Ride
Editor's note: This is the second of a series of posts about Emily and Kerri Lynn's week-long trip to North Carolina in hopes of witnessing loggerhead sea turtles nesting. Check out last year's trip to see sea turtles hatching. Stay tuned for more updates this week.
Last night I learned what it’s like to be an all-night sea turtle patroller. Okay, so I only did it for a little more than an hour, but I think I got the idea.
Kerri Lynn and I joined the BHI turtle interns on their patrol rounds on the beach, which start at 9 p.m. and end at 6 a.m. The patrols are crucial to the on-the-beach conservation process. The interns tag the females, take measurements, and mark the location of the nests to build protective cages over them to keep out foxes and other predators.
Plus, they relocate a nest if it is laid on a vulnerable section of beach. So far this year, they’ve had to relocate a whopping nine of the twelve nests mainly due to beach erosion.
Nesting Nights: Hoping for a Glimpse
Editor's note: This is the first of a series of posts about Emily and Kerri Lynn's week-long trip to North Carolina in hopes of witnessing loggerhead sea turtles nesting.
Check out last year's trip to see sea turtles hatching. Stay tuned for more updates this week.
Greetings! Oceana science fellow Kerri Lynn Miller and I are down on Bald Head Island, NC hoping to witness female loggerhead sea turtles laying their eggs.
Yesterday evening we attended the Bald Head Island Conservancy’s sea turtle talk and spoke about Oceana’s work to protect sea turtles. We asked folks to sign postcards telling the government to put turtle excluder devices (TEDs) in all trawl fisheries in the U.S., which accidentally capture hundreds of sea turtles every year.
After the talk ended, around 9:45, several dozen of us with red-cellophane-wrapped flashlights headed to the beach in the hopes of seeing a female come ashore. Spoiler alert: we didn’t see one. But hey, it was only the first night.
We waited until almost midnight on the beach stargazing and talking turtles with Anna, one of the BHIC’s six sea turtle interns this season. She clutched a walkie talkie, hoping to get word from the other interns patrolling the beach on utility vehicles that they’d come across a turtle.
Around 11:30 her radio crackled – “Anna, can you hear me?” the voice said. A long pause, and all of us were suddenly on the edge of our sandy blanket.
Waiting for Hatchlings, Part 4
[Several days after Day 2]
It’s the end of my week here at Bald Head Island, and I think it goes without saying (if you’ve read any of the previous posts), it’s been a great trip. I’ve been especially lucky with nest #89.
Waiting for Hatchlings, Part 3
Day 2 (later that day)
After the morning of nest excavations, Cory and I catch up on sleep for a few hours. Before we know it, it’s time to check in with loggerhead nest #89 again.
Out on the beach the haloed moon is astonishingly bright, and seems to be directly in front of the turtle nest’s sand runway. There’s no question that if the turtles make it out alive, they’ll know where to go. By 8:30, a crowd of 15 people or so has gathered around the nest.
The two women from Kansas and Colorado are here again, and there are some newcomers, including a couple from Wisconsin. “How do they breathe under there? They’re buried alive!” the wife cries. Around 9, the sand starts to move.
Every few minutes, Donna the nest monitor says, “Did you see that?” The sand is moving, or “simmering,” in sea turtle-speak, a reference to what happens when all the turtles come pouring out of the nest – a “full boil.” I find it strange that we use cooking terms for this.
Waiting for Hatchlings, Part 1
Greetings from Bald Head Island, North Carolina! I’m sitting on the porch of my parents’ beach house watching the waves break just over the dune ridge. It’s sunny, there’s a pleasant but insistent breeze, and a cicada chirps in a nearby tree.
Cory Wilson, expedition photographer, and I have been here for barely a day-and-a-half, and already there’s much to report. I’ll start from the beginning.
Day 1
We arrive on the island at sunset after seven hours driving from DC. We are tired but relieved to find ourselves in a place where the only modes of transport are golf carts and one-speed bicycles and the main activities of the island include climbing the stone lighthouse known as “Old Baldy.”
After a brief stop at my favorite turtle pond to look for one of the island's gators, there's no more dallying. We’re on a mission – take us to the sea turtles, we tell our host, the Bald Head Island Conservancy’s (BHIC) head naturalist, Maureen Dewire. She directs us to loggerhead nest #89, which she thinks is “gonna go” tonight. “What time?” I ask. “Any time between sunset and sunrise,” she says. Oh. Why was I thinking there was a convenient window between 8 and 10 pm when they always come out? Wishful thinking.
